Sunday, May 9, 2010

Last year we had two families over for a mother's day brunch. This year, we went crazy and had 20 people over. It was, if I do say so myself, a grand success! Both kids and parents stuffed themselves to capacity with purely vegan fare and no one made a single joke about bacon. So, let's take a look at the spread:In the front on the left are two spinach and sun-dried tomato frittatas, based on Isa's swiss chard frittata from Vegan Brunch.I had two bags of baby spinach I had intended to use in an Indian dish this week but never got around to making. I figured sun-dried tomatoes would make the perfect accompaniment (they did). I was a little worried about the whole thing holding together so I added 2 tbsp of chickpea flour. The end result was amazing: nice and tender and bursting with flavour. I scaled back on the soy and seasoned with black salt to get a nice eggy flavour.

On the front right is polenta rancheros, also from Vegan Brunch. What you are looking at is a bowl of soft polenta, a bowl of black beans in rancheros sauce, and a variety of fixins (red onion, tomato, cashew sour cream, guacamole). This is a fantastic dish. You start with some beans, add a dollop of polenta, then garnish. This one is going into my brunch rotation.

In the back are oven roasted potatoes, and piles of pancakes (also Isa's recipe from Vegan Brunch.)I also made some whole wheat bread for toast.Son#1 made these signs for all the homemade jams and jellies.In addition to cinnamon buns, I made these thumbprint rolls from Reinhart's Artisan Breads for Everyday. These are a sweet roll filled with fruit and glazed with icing, and they disappeared pretty quickly. I put the fruit filling in a piping bag and I found that to be an effective way to get maximum filling in without making a huge mess.

The guests brought muffins, fruit salad and trays, juices, and coffee and tea.

I make Isa's pancake recipe every Sunday morning and have found that if you replace at least half to all of the flour with spelt, they turn out much fluffier. Also try adding macaroon style coconut shreds to the batter. The texture this gives the pancakes is AMAZING!!!!